


I love you, goodbye

by bioticfox (ayambik)



Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol as a Coping Mechanism, Canonical Character Death, Confessions, Developing Relationship, F/M, First Kiss, Flirting, Fluff and Angst, Non-Linear Narrative, Past drug addiction (mention), Post-Virmire, Sometimes badly, Virmire (Mass Effect), Virmire Survivor, mostly angst, past recreational drug use (mentioned), pre-Virmire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-23
Updated: 2020-03-23
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:47:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23157310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ayambik/pseuds/bioticfox
Summary: A relationship develops, and a relationship is destroyed. Kaidan and Ashley though a series of scenes pre- and post- Virmire.
Relationships: Kaidan Alenko/Ashley Williams
Comments: 8
Kudos: 15
Collections: Spectre Requisitions 2020





	I love you, goodbye

**Author's Note:**

  * For [BardofHeartDive](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BardofHeartDive/gifts).



> My assignment for BardofHeartDive. I hope it fills your request!
> 
> No beta, sorry for any mistakes. I double and triple checked, but if you spot any typos, please let me know. Deadlines can be rough!

He didn’t plan the kiss. He didn’t even realize it happened at first. It took two full heartbeats and Williams clearing her throat for Kaidan’s brain to catch up to what he’d done.

“Er...” He stood there, frozen, gym bag hanging awkwardly off one shoulder, ready to fall but saved by the death grip of Kaidan’s clenched fist. “That was- I mean, I didn’t… think?”

He phrased it like a question, confused as he was, probably equally as confused as Ashley herself. Kissing her goodbye had been a natural instinct, though he couldn’t say why. They weren’t dating. Another two heartbeats went by before he managed to bring his eyes to hers. She stood stock still, a mirror image of Kaidan, eyebrows raised, and staring straight back at him. He winced.

“That’s alright, LT,” she said, taking pity on him eventually. “I’ll let you off. But you have to promise me one thing.” Kaidan nodded, face flushed red, and he tried his best not to shuffle his feet. “The next time you kiss me, promise that it will be a hell of a lot more romantic than that.”

“I-” he said, dumbfounded, eyes wide. He cleared his throat as Ashley looked on expectantly. “Er, yes. Alright. I promise.”

* * *

The ice in the glass had long since melted, the whiskey beginning to warm under the heat of Kaidan’s palm clamped around the tumbler. He watched as the warm brown alcohol swirled and caught the light, and all he could think was that it matched the colour of her eyes. 

Her laughter kept playing on repeat inside his head. So did the shouts and the screaming, the boldness as she told Shepard to leave, to go get Kaidan instead. The static and the silence that came after were a torment he couldn't stop hearing. He shivered in the chill of the room and stared down at his glass, briefly entertaining the idea of finding something stronger. The whiskey had been his attempt to drown it all out, but it was doing a damn poor job of it, and there _wasn’t_ much else stronger on the ship, not that he knew of. That was the problem with deployment, he thought, no respite other than work and, if you were lucky, sleep.

Ashley’s voice filtered in through the haze. A vivid memory of words heard through the speakers in his helmet and the pounding of blood in his ears, tinny and distorted. The last thing she ever said.

_“I understand Commander. I don’t regret a thing.”_

He closed his eyes and took another sip, the burn of the whiskey barely noticeable.

* * *

“That’s some story,” Kaidan said, pulling off his helmet on re-entry to the Normandy. His face had a light sheen of sweat and his hair stuck up at odd angles, no matter how many times he ran his fingers through it. “Just because you can’t admit I saved your ass-”

“Bullshit, LT,” Ashley scoffed, closely following Kaidan out of the airlock, nodding to Shepard as she passed. “You’d have been a sitting duck if it weren’t for me taking out that scout.”

“I had it under control, you know. I’m biotic, I can do things.”

“Things, huh?” She waggled her eyebrows, leering suggestively in his direction. “Is that what they’re calling it these days?”

Ashley cackled as Kaidan’s head fell into his hands, groaning into his locker. “That’s not what I meant…” His hands muffled his voice, but the deep red of the back of his neck didn’t lie. Ashley tried her hardest not to find it adorable, and failed.

“No it isn’t,” she agreed, instead of telling Kaidan about the warm feeling in her chest or the butterflies in her stomach. “But I win, and now you, Alenko, get to clean my armor for me.”

“I didn’t agree to that,” he sputtered, launching himself up only to have her helmet shoved into his arms.

“Too late,” she said, turning around and sauntering off in the direction of the showers and Kaidan blushed even harder as he watched her leave.

* * *

The Citadel air was- well, not refreshing, but it made a change from the air on the Normandy. Kaidan couldn’t put his finger on what was different exactly, but all spaceships seemed to have a muted feeling, one that you only noticed when you left and breathed in something else. He opened his mouth to ask Ash if she’d noticed it too, when she slipped her hand into his without warning. 

“Deep in thought there, Kaidan?”

“Nothing important,” he said with a smile and a squeeze to her hand.

“Well, if you want to- hey!”

A man rounded the corner at speed, slamming into Ashley where she stood. She momentarily lost her balance, taking a few steps back at the force of the impact, and Kaidan reached out a hand to steady her.

“Watch where you’re going,” the man snapped, rounding on them with bared teeth and blown pupils, a snarling animal with ill-fitting clothes and unwashed hair. Kaidan took in the red-rimmed eyes and jaunt cheekbones, and started to raise a placating hand. “Piss off, Alenko,” the man shoved by, leaving Kaidan and Ashley on the path, quick strides carrying him off into the crowds. 

“You know that jerk?” Ashley’s eyebrows rose and she looked over her shoulder at the man quickly disappearing in the masses. “Doesn’t exactly seem like you’d hang around in the same circles.”

Kaidan rubbed his hand over the back of his neck, frowning

. He barely recognised the man anymore, but if it was who he thought it was... He motioned over to the nearest bench. “Come on, let’s sit.”

“Uh oh,” Ashley said, in a forced jovial tone as they went to sit side by side. “Sounds important.”

Kaidan only nodded. “I,told you about BaAT, but after... Well, I fell into a bit of a hole, ended up mixing with the wrong crowd. That guy we just ran into went by the name of Raym. And, he sold various substances to various people. Including me.”

“He was your dealer?” 

“Yeah, he was." He frowned over at the place where Raym had disappeared, watching the people mix and mingle, the hum of the crowds, getting lost in the vibrancy of life around them. Mixed emotions collided inside him. Relief and terror. All the skeletons he kept in his closet were now Ashley's to rummage through at her leisure. Her hand came to rest on Kaidan’s arm and gripped him tight at the sight of the crease in between his eyebrows. 

“Thank you for telling me." Ashley squeezed his arm once again. Kaidan turned back to her, still frowning. She smiled. "I’m proud of you. Getting yourself out of that can’t have been easy. But you did. And now you’re here. With me. And I’m proud of you.”

Kaidan smiled at her softly, and chose instead to lose himself in her eyes and her embrace.

* * *

“How could we just leave her down there?”

Kaidan sat in the debrief opposite Shepard and Liara. He tried to appear calm, though his stomach clearly had other ideas. One wrong move and he’d be throwing up on Shepard’s polished regulation boots.

“Williams knew the risks going in,” Shepard said, and Kaidan wanted to scream at her for her composure. Wanted to scream at himself for his. There was nothing to push back on, no excuses for losing control. “She gave her life to save the rest of us.”

“But why me?” He exhaled, one long, shaky breath, and tried not to let the shards of a broken heart show up on his face. “Why not her?”

“I did what I had to do. The only one to blame here is Saren.”

The blood rushing in Kaidan’s ears drowned out the rest of her speech. Saren be damned. Kaidan failed the woman he loved, that was on his shoulders alone.

* * *

Kaidan lay on his bed, empty bottle at his side, wrinkled sheets woven and tangled through his legs, down towards the bottom of the pod. It was dark save the orange glow from his omni-tool, which illuminated his face in a vibrant orange hue, much too bright for his liking. He’d probably end up with a migraine, though at this point it didn’t really matter. He’d probably welcome it. All-encompassing physical pain to wash him clean, rinse him out, and put him back together again. 

_We should’ve been able to save her._

He grimaced in the dark and closed the article he’d been unable to focus on, the endless scrolling unable to distract him from the thoughts that kept surfacing in his head. Instead, he found himself staring at Ash, a photo he took less than two weeks ago. It captured her as she had been then, beautiful and vivid and alive, smiling bright at the camera. Now she was gone. This kind of pain he _didn’t_ want. It was emotional and messy and his head swirled and his heart ached. 

_Ash died because of me._

The guilt ate him up and spat him out, and before he knew it, his fingers were hovering over a name in his contacts. One he’d not used in years. 

It wasn’t Raym. Even back then, he’d stopped using Raym for his fix. Too unpredictable. There were others though, and rumor had it they were still in the business. The numbing sensation of oblivion seemed awfully tempting compared to the memories of Ash. And that was all he had now. Memories.

The decision to delete the contact instead came after only a few brief moments. He’d worked too hard to get out to go falling back in, and Ash would’ve been disappointed in him if he did. The orange glow cut out abruptly, the omni-tool put away, leaving him alone in the dark with the image of her smile in his head.

* * *

The Mako impacted with a lurch. 

“Hey! A little more grace on the landing would be appreciated, Shepard!” Ashley grumbled, twisting down to pick up her fallen helmet from the floor. She was promptly ignored, Shepard instead moving to open comms back to the Normandy. Kaidan caught the hint of a scowl on Ash's face, before it was quickly obscured from view, nimble fingers flicking the clasps to lock her helmet in place. He couldn’t help but laugh. “Think it’s funny, LT?”

“Absolutely not.”

Her voice now came through the comms in his ear, and she punched him playfully on the arm. “Yeah, yeah. Laugh it up. Let’s just get this over with. Kill the geth, find the salarians. I’ve got a hot shower with my name on it back on the ship.”

Before she pulled her arm away, Kaidan reached up and intertwined their fingers, resting their joined hands between them. “It’s a shame, though,” he said, waiting for Shepard to finish the routine landing check. “Any other time and this would be a beautiful place. Nice beach, clear ocean. I could come here for a vacation.”

 _“We_ could come here for a vacation you mean.” Her eyes sparkled in a perfect mirror of the ocean outside, and Kaidan found he wanted nothing more than to watch the waves in them for hours.

“Yeah,” he said softly, voice a little rough. “We could. Next time.” It was a promise. And then, for the first time he said: “I love you.”

The fingers he held in his squeezed tight, as tight as possible with two pairs of gauntleted hands. She turned to rest her helmet against his and softly returned the words. “I love you too.”

It was a perfect moment of peace. 

“Alright,” Shepard said, breaking the silence. “Let’s go.”


End file.
